A village? Maybe it just takes one adult who cares

This just in: Teachers may be the strongest line of defense in the fight to prevent students from dropping out of high school. The latest in a series of mini-reports by the California Dropout Research Project might not qualify as earth-shattering news, but it does lend credence to an important idea about dropout prevention: Dropouts are often the students who fall between the cracks, who never get the feeling that anyone cares if they stay in school.

The dropout project researchers interviewed 133 mostly Latino students in five California high schools to determine their attitudes about staying in school. Among the conclusions:

• Students generally like school and want to graduate.
• Some feel financial pressure to drop out and get a job.
• Some are driven out of school by a fear of violence.
• Students believe that some of the challenges they face are caused by a lack of resources in their school.
• Students who believe a teacher or coach cares about them are more inclined to stay in school.

Says the report: "It often takes just one caring adult who believes in them to shift students' motivation to complete high school."

You can download the entire report or a condensed version here, and see a series of video clips of student interviews here. The report is the latest in a series of findings by the dropout researchers, based at UC Santa Barbara.

-- Mitchell Landsberg

Comments

[Erika Chua]

What an encouraging report! It is nice to know that the research supports the influence a caring teacher can have on the life of an individual student.